


Victim Complex

by softnotlizzie



Series: Dream's Interludes [1]
Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Dream Team SMP Angst (Video Blogging RPF), Dream Team SMP Spoilers, Dreamon, Gen, Hearing Voices, Hurt No Comfort, Possession, Post-Manberg Festival on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), Post-Manberg-Pogtopia War on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), This is a headcanon, an au if you will, im not an apologist, kind of, no beta we die like men, still hate tagging no surprise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-23
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-14 19:21:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28925730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softnotlizzie/pseuds/softnotlizzie
Summary: What if Dream wasn't entirely Dream? What if there were some other forces at place? What if he didn't want to be the bad guy anymore?Who do you miss the most?Alternatively, insight into Dream's mind over the course of TommyInnit's visit, with some headcanoning and alteration of characters motivations.
Relationships: Clay | Dream & GeorgeNotFound & Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF), Clay | Dream & GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF), Clay | Dream & Sam | Awesamdude, Clay | Dream & Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF), Clay | Dream & Toby Smith | Tubbo, Clay | Dream & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Sam | Awesamdude & TommyInnit
Series: Dream's Interludes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2128407
Comments: 4
Kudos: 206





	Victim Complex

**Author's Note:**

> ayo im back what's up you sexy motherfuckers!
> 
> i have a feeling i'm bordering on controversial with this one so i feel it's important to note that i am NOT sympathizing with c!Dream nor apologizing for his actions. C!dream is a bitch and i'll kick his ass. This is a head canon fic. This is me writing this fun thing called an AU. please keep this in mind. :))
> 
> anyway, i hope you enjoy!!! i love you all!!

Are you happy, now?

Is this what you wanted to happen?

Are you proud of yourself, Clay?

Yes. Yes, he was.

Dream sat with his back against the cold obsidian wall of his cell, and closed his eyes, telling that voice in his head that Yes, he was proud of himself.

He’d done what needed to be done.

They all hated him. Tommy and Tubbo had hated Dream for plenty of time now. He knew that, and he accepted it. Things were better that way. Dream’s mind flashed to Sam, the warden’s hand holding just a little too firmly onto Dream’s bony wrist. He pictured Punz, and how Dream hadn’t even understood why Punz’s eyes were filled with mischief rather than boredom and blind compliance.

Sapnap.

Sapnap who had been there while they’d built that stupid community house. While they chased George around for absolutely no apparent reason and teased Tommy until he ran off to Wilbur. Sapnap stood facing Dream, and stayed there until Tommy and Tubbo were out of sight.

Opposing Dream.

He knew it was better that way. Of course, it was. He and the voice agreed on just one thing: cutting attachments was a good idea. 

If he hadn’t, Sapnap might be feeling betrayed right now rather than victorious. Sam might be feeling disappointed in him rather than proud of his prison’s capability. Tommy and Tubbo would be dead. Not frolicking along, so much more carelessly than they could afford. Dream had known something the voice didn’t, though.

As much as he cut off attachments with his friends, it wouldn’t stop them from forming their own, new connections. So Sapnap befriended Punz, and George fell in with Quackity and Karl. Tommy and Tubbo finally let someone protect them, and Puffy did a damn good job of it. And altogether, cutting attachments had been Dream’s downfall.

If he hadn’t, he would be out there, blind and useless to the voice’s will, using his body like a puppet. 

Dream had always felt sympathetic and similar to Techno. The talent, the bloodlust, and nonchalance, the unfailing confidence. The only difference is that Techno had many voices, all parts of his own conscious.

Dream had one, and he knew—more than he’d even known anything in his life—that it didn’t belong there. That fucking voice wasn’t him.

But it sounded like him.

You’re happy, it said, voice sharp and mocking. You’re happy that you fucked up the one thing you were supposed to do, and now look at us. Stuck in this fucking four-by-four. What are you going to do now, huh? Huh?

Dream leaned his head back to rest against the hard stone. He drew his knees up closer to his chest, and pinched his eyes tighter shut. 

They’re safe, was all Dream said in return. 

The voice babbled on, but after so long (how long had it been? Months? Years?) of dealing with it, he’d learned how to shut it out. Sometimes, it was comforting. Sometimes, it reminded him of when he used to fall asleep listening to George or Sapnap ramble on about something stupid.

Dream genuinely couldn’t remember when the voice had stopped being a narration of his conscious thoughts and more of an unwelcome presence. Definitely before the beginning of the Disk War, so long ago. Before everything, before L’Manburg was built, and then blown up, and then built again, and then blown up again, and then built again, and blown up for the final time. Before Fundy. Before the election, before Schlatt, before the second war. Sometimes he barely remembered things from back then. Like blackouts scattered randomly throughout his memory. Like he hadn’t been the one in control of his body.

He wasn’t going to pretend that he wasn’t to blame, though. Dream had always been competitive and a little too harsh over things he considered his, but he didn’t remember being so manipulative. So violent and so selfish. 

Dream attributed some of it to the voice, and some of it to constant built up pressure and stress and allowing that to give the voice more room in his mind until he felt like he was more voice than he was Dream. 

It felt like getting angry. 

That was why Dream never knew where he stopped, and the voice began.

Well, that’s not entirely true, he supposed. 

The voice liked watching Tommy get mad and yell and scream, and liked watching him give up just as much. Dream hated it. That wasn’t Tommy. The voice wanted Tubbo dead to manipulate Tommy; Dream wanted him to be at peace, and if death was the way to do it, then so be it. The voice wanted L’Manburg gone, nothing but radioactive emptiness in its place. Dream would rather people be happy under his land, but he knew that they needed independence and autonomy. He would’ve given that to them.

The voice wanted power. Dream wanted calm.

They didn’t agree on much.

But Dream liked that he was locked away now. The worst thing he could do from behind a hundred impenetrable layers of stuff was verbally harass people, and they had the power to walk away. Part of him wished Tommy had just taken that last life. Dream knew that the words that came out of his mouth, about the book, about everything—they were true, but they weren’t his words. He would be safer dead than here, where anyone could just…let him out. 

He would pray that they didn’t. 

Instead, he sat there, back to the wall, and listened to the screams. 

“Dream.”

Fuck.

“Tommy,” Dream’s vocal cords were hoarse. Had he been screaming? Or…how long had it been since he’d last spoken? A more pressing matter, why was Tommy here. “Hello.”

He lifted his head, and thought about standing to face Tommy, but tried putting just a little bit of pressure on his injured leg and decided against it. He’d rather sit than stumble. Dream was glad that what was left of his shattered mask stayed firmly over the left side of his face. It was easier to pretend with only half.

“Why are you here?” Dream asked carefully. He allowed no emotion into his tone.

“I said I’d come and see you, didn’t I?” Tommy said, crossing his arms over his chest. “I’m a man of my word.”

The room grew silent. Tommy seemed nervous. Why shouldn’t he be?

Dream was familiar with many of the security mechanisms of the prison. Tommy was almost definitely stood there—facing his worst and (usually) most dangerous enemy—with half a heart remaining. 

Neither of them had any idea what to say. The room was shuffling feet and sideways glances. Eye contact ignored and words dying on the tongue. 

“So, how are you, Big Man?” Tommy finally asked. He was beyond uncomfortable; it was easy to see. Dream almost wanted to offer him and out. Scream and fight and lunge at Tommy until he had no choice but to call Sam and take him back. It would be better for Tommy that way. If he could think of Dream and always see the villain. If he never had to witness this pitiful, weak side of him.

The side he was when the voice wasn’t in control.

“Um…I’m bored,” is what Dream said instead. 

Tommy offered him a pity laugh. The corner of Dream’s mouth quirked upwards in an appreciative smile. 

He supposed he could sit and try to be calm with Tommy for a bit. Maybe…maybe Tommy would like that.

So, the two of them just…enjoyed each other’s company for a bit. Well, Dream did, at least. And Tommy was laughing and joking as usual, but Dream knew that that behavior was also Tommy’s defense mechanism. The boy would stand across from Dream and joke with him and take his things all he wanted, but if Dream flipped that little switch in his mind, Tommy would be reduced to the mess he’d been in exile. The mess that Dream had made of him. 

Dream wasn’t an idiot. He’d seen how bad Tommy had gotten during that time, even if he was trapped behind the control of the voice, unable to interfere. He saw how Tommy reacted around the lava, and the high surfaces. He saw how Tommy stumbled on his words when Dream moved too quickly. He saw how Tommy kept his arms crossed over his torso in order to cover for the armor Sam had undoubtedly taken from him. 

Their time together was tenuous, but Dream would take it over the sole interaction being a tormenting, abusive, inescapable voice. 

Tommy seemed to know that Dream was off. He asked questions that he knew would be hard to answer. Do you feel bad? Do you regret it? Do you feel lonely?

Do you know, now, how it was for me?

No. Dream didn’t know. He would never know.

At some point, Dream started answering the questions honestly. Before, it was all jokes. Jokes to hide the pain, as one does. Laugh louder than the voice in your head. Louder than the sparks of the lava pooling around you. Focus your eyes somewhere—anywhere—other than the blue eyes boring into you.

At some point, Tommy wasn’t laughing either.

“How do you feel, Dream?”

Do you tell him? What if he thinks you’re being manipulative? You’ve done it in the past. What if he starts to pity you? What if he tries to help? What if you do so well, for so long, and then you lose control all over again? What if he takes over?

“Lonely.”

Dream shook his head, as if it would clear all the noise. All it did was further disorient him. He didn’t have a bed in here. He sat on the floor. Back against the wall, like before, let the cool metal ground you.

Tommy shuffled towards Dream slowly, as if he was a wild animal, cornered and scared.

Was he not?

“Why did you do it, Dream?” Tommy asked, voice calm and careful. Dream had heard it only once like that before. Only once so collected and serious. 

I was your sidekick. Don’t go. I don’t want you to go.

“Why did you hurt all this people? Why did you hurt the people who loved you?”

“I told you why,” Dream said, and was surprised to find his own voice surprisingly calm. Is this what it felt like to be the leader of your own mind? “I can’t—all those attachments. They make you vulnerable.”

“But,” Tommy shook his head just slightly. “Don’t you hurt?”

Dream’s fingers felt warm. Disconnected. Heating up constantly, by the second. One of his fists clenched. Did he do that?

When it became clear, after many long minutes of dead air between them, that Dream would not be answering that question, Tommy sighed and took a step back. He turned away from Dream, faced the lava. He was so close to it. Dream wondered—just for a moment—if he needed to pull Tommy away from the burning again. It wasn’t his time to die.

But Tommy turned back around. He walked hurriedly toward Dream, more confident than he’d been during the whole visit. Still certainly on half a heart of health. He crouched in front of Dream, forcing him to make eye contact. Tommy was less than a foot away from him.

“Who do you miss the most?”

Dream froze. The heat from his fingers had spread entirely up to his neck. His fists clenched even tighter, and his eyes flicked away from Tommy’s and onto the clock on the wall behind him.

He liked the clock. It made no noise. It was predictable. The clock was a constant.

“You have to miss somebody,” Tommy pressed, apparently not willing to settle with the fact that Dream was slowly becoming entirely unresponsive. “So…who? Who do you miss the most?”

Dream stood abruptly, knocking Tommy away from him. The younger boy flinched visibly at the sudden movement, and Dream’s soul filled with guilt that he ended up having no time to address. His eyes stayed locked on the clock across the room. His fingers found themselves tangled into his hair. It was too long. And so dirty. 

“Tommy, you should go,” Dream said softly. He almost wasn’t sure that Tommy had heard him.

“Wha—no! No, tell me, Dream. Who do you miss the most?”

“Guard!” Dream yelled, his voice quivering with anxiety. Even then, he heard the foreign tone slip into his voice, heard himself become a little less him…

And a little more voice.

“Tommy’s ready to go,” Dream said, struggling to hold control long enough to get Tommy out of the cell before he said something he’d regret. Before the voice took control of more than just his mouth. 

Tommy was fighting it. Yelling his fierce protests at Sam as the warden’s voice crackled in through the speakers, and pushing his questions onto Dream in between. Dream found himself wanting to listen to the voice in his head rather than listen to Tommy. The teen was only riling him up, making things so many times worse.

“Get in the hole, Tommy,” Dream muttered. Somehow, through the chaos, Tommy heard him.

“No.” 

Fuck. Dream was traumatizing him all over again. But Tommy…he had to get in the hole; there was no other way out. Dream needed him out.

Dream repeated himself, slowly pacing towards Tommy and cornering him into the corner, where the pool of water was waiting. He couldn’t tell if Sam’s voice was making Tommy feel better or worse. He was saying the same thing—Get in the hole, Tommy—but at least it wasn’t Dream’s voice saying those words.

He needed him out. Out. Out. Out. Tommy had to get out.

Finally, Tommy tripped, sliding backwards into the hole, water splashing around him. Dream watched the panic fill his eyes, and he almost reached out, but within seconds, Tommy was gone. 

Dream heard his terror filled scream as he was transported roughly to the other side of the lava layers between them. Sam didn’t say anything else. He cut the connection to the cell, and Dream was left with his thoughts again.

Were they his thoughts? Did they belong to him at all? Did his body belong to him?

He felt himself pacing wildly around the tiny cell, hands pulling at his hair. He wouldn’t be surprised if, when he removed his hands, strands of loose hair came with it. The voice was screaming so loudly that he couldn’t discern one word from another. He wasn’t even sure that there was only one voice speaking. 

Who do you miss the most, Dream?

Dream forced himself back once more, back pressed hard against the stone. It wasn’t even cold anymore.

Who do you miss the most?

The person I used to be.

**Author's Note:**

> anyways that finale was a WILD. RIDE. i cried s e v e r a l times. punz's army--ugh so sexy of him. i love this sam dude he's my fav. "Who am i without you? yourself." bitch u already know.
> 
> who knows? depending on the reception, this might turn into a series of Dream's Interludes. i enjoyed writing something completely outside of canon characteristics for once! pls lemme know how you liked it, it makes my day! gn!!


End file.
